


The Music of the Sphere

by wizardslexicon



Category: Old Kingdom - Garth Nix, Young Wizards - Diane Duane
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-23
Updated: 2013-02-23
Packaged: 2017-12-03 07:55:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,667
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/695996
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wizardslexicon/pseuds/wizardslexicon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Seven greatest wizards of their time unite to stop the Lone One become the Ninth Bright Shiner from obliterating the earth. A rewrite of the conclusion of Abhorsen.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Music of the Sphere

_Nine_.  
The loch valley became as nothing before the unyielding white fury of the Ninth Bright Shiner, the Starsnuffer, completely disassociating any buildings that remained. The great loch, serene and blue, boiled like the metal of a newborn star, rising in a cloud of steam that burned birds to nothing and scorched the very air to a fine crisp.  
Lirael felt the quiet intonation of the Speech more than she heard it over the rage of the hemispheres, come to rend the earth asunder. Her companions were with her, using the greatest bindings available to them to give some minor protection. The time seemed to burn away like the rocks burned and melted to slag, quick as the flash of scorching white light as the blast tore the hill that protected the party to a shadow of nothing, as everything capable of burning burned.  
After the hill was gone, so was the first diamond of protection, which pulsed bravely before dying in the face of a power no such diamond had ever known. _One_. Although the spell took years from life, using so many for the work distributed the years lost much more evenly. No one would miss one year.  
The blast was followed by a wind nearly as hot as the flame, and flesh-destroying steam. It was as though the world would be destroyed an eighth time in that howling, screaming hell. The diamond went before the world did, lasting about five seconds. Its effort was valiant, but against the Destroyer it was no more than a stack of building blocks. _Two_. Two years of happiness, gone. Lirael could hear Sam’s breath coming dry and desperate. They were all thinking it. I don’t want to die. But Lirael had seen the Ninth Gate, and she held no fear of those brilliant stars.  
The third diamond fell, having done its duty in repelling the molten remains of lightningrods and debris. A cloud like a malevolent mushroom towered above them, an unearthly shape that drove fear of the unknown into the hearts of the Seven. Lirael had remembranced this; the single patch on unscorched earth that the group stood on seemed like a healthy cell in a cancerous tumor.  
Sam handed her the blade that would end two lives. Lirael took it, and took her fate. While the wizardry worked on the blade, the overlays of the distinctive Wallmaker style extended to it, was a great thing, a great price was to be paid. Free energy is wasted energy, and entropy was running. Seeing the tower of death rising above them as the cloud, Lirael had no hesitation. Better do die, than to do nothing, and let the Power who was Orannis consume this world and the life on it. Lirael meant the Oath she had taken from the _Book_ , and she meant every word.  
 _In Life’s Name, and for Life’s sake_...There was no life to be found other than the Seven amidst this half-melted landscape, heat rippling the air. The entropy in Lirael’s bones sang, but her lips remained tight. These were her last minutes on the earth, and then...  
“Timeheart,” said Touchstone behind her, placing a large hand more gently on her shoulder than many but Sabriel had seen. “That is all that awaits you. What’s loved, lives.”  
“And was I loved?” asked Lirael, as she turns down the darkest paths to the fluid metal sphere that is the only true evil in the universe. The Dog nipped her lightly on the leg.  
“Do not insult me by asking that question. I love you, Lirael.” And then nothing more remained to be said, because they now surrounded the sphere, taking their chosen places. Lirael began the first tones of the Speech, the recitation of the Shiners’ original Choice.  
Orannis’ flames trailed out towards the circle as the sphere pulsed horribly, growing in size. The twisting, silent flames formed a voice that craved the empty darkness of a world without life, a world without energy. Pure destruction. It spoke the Speech not in tones of convincing the universe; it spoke to control.  
“And now another Seven comes, all a-clamor to lock Orannis once more in metal, deep under earth. But can a Seven of such watered blood and thinner power prevail against the Destroyer, last and mightiest of the Nine?” Lirael felt that cruel, sardonic intelligence sweep over them like a watchful goddess of battle.  
“I think not.” Spoken in the Speech, the conviction was stronger than any binding spell, but a girl who knew darkness at an age when many were discovering light spoke, her tongue burning from the uncontrolled power and her lips bleeding from the dry, unlubricated movement.   
“Fairest and fallen, greetings and defiance.” Lirael could not feel surprise, and it does not do for a wizard to lie. Orannis had expected at least this much. That did not mean a thing. “I stand for Astarael against you.” Etching a graceful character of the Speech along with the might of the local recension, the Charter, Lirael bolstered the next giver.  
“As I stood against your vassals, those who you overshadowed, I stand against you. Fairest and fallen, greetings and defiance.” Sabriel’s voice carried a strength unlike any other. A resolute bell like Saraneth, so bound to the Champion, was destined for her hand. Her mark blazed as strong as her spirit. “I stand for Saraneth against you.”  
“The Wallmakers build, and your entropy destroys. Our Art carved the land from the firmament; and we have no intention of letting you erode it.” Sam’s fury seemed to stem not from the broken earth, but from his broken comrade. The fury poured radiance into his character as he etched it into the ground. “I stand for Belgaer against you. Fairest and fallen, greetings and defiance.”  
Ellimere’s pride as she made her strokes was palpable, but it only seemed to amuse Orannis. With the poise of a dancer and the tension of a duelist, she drew her mark. “Fairest and fallen, greetings and defiance. I stand for Dyrim against you.”  
The Dog snorted. “I pay you no greetings, but you may have my defiance. As I did, I do. I am Kibeth and I stand against you.” Her mark flowed from her Charter-bound skin to the air, where it hung, stubborn and resolute.  
Sanar and Ryelle drew the mark as they did everything: together. If this was to be the end of everything, better to burn together than burn alone. They did not intend to burn at all. “We stand as one for Mosrael, against you.” Nothing more was said. Nothing more was necessary. Orannis was not pleased.  
“Fairest and fallen, greetings and defiance,” called Touchstone like the berserker he was. “I am Torrigan, called Touchstone, and I stand for Ranna against you. Drawing himself up as the mighty king he was, he drew his mark in strong, powerful strokes. Then he rang the Sleepbringer, just as in their turn the Waker, Walker, Speaker, Thinker, Binder, and Banisher sang their tones along with softly spoken words in the Speech. The universe listened almost desperately to their song, searching for salvation.  
And salvation came, for a moment. As the music against the spheres rose up, Orannis seemed to consider it. A ring of power formed, constricting the sphere tightly, but the ring’s purifying strength was held back, restrained by nothing but sheer force of will and a power beyond belief.  
“No.” And in that one word, all hope was lost. The ring pushed outward, beaten by the might of the Ninth and the weakness of the Seven. Lirael’s Remembrancing was for nothing. The world would die, and the universe would die a little bit faster because there was a power that no being could stand against—  
“Be free, Mogget!” shouted Sam. “Choose well!” The vaguely humanoid pillar formed of white fire and an eldritch beauty seemed to move to Lirael’s side, though its body did not seem to move or change. Lirael’s tear-streaked, desperate face turned, lung full of Orannis’ hate, and pleaded.  
The fury of Mogget receded into a humanoid body with the radiance of a galaxy, and extended a hand almost lazily. “I am Yrael,” it said, “I could not Choose when you offered the Choice, but I will change that all now. I...stand against you.” Its fire jumped into ring, all silver and aglow, and bolstered it, and everyone stepped forward with the sudden boost.  
The music woven by word, and the songs of Yrael and Kibeth, resonated, as the bells rang and the sphere began to contract as the ring did. As it did so, the old silver color of the once-divided hemispheres began to appear again, and Orannis’ bitter voice sounded one last time.  
“Why, Yrael?”  
“Because I have spoken to aeons old starlight when the dew was fresh. Because I have felt the warm wind on my skin on a moonlit night. Because the joy of speaking to life, be it stone or tree, is the only thing worth having. Because—” And Lirael could no longer hesitate, cleaving down with the reforged Nehima and imbibing the poisonous rage of the Ninth, ready to die. The Ninth Gate was something she was finally ready for.  
The slicing edge melted as the Shiner parted, and flowed over her hand and forearm, and skin-melting wave of pain and suffering, but Lirael sliced on as the song reached its crescendo and the final proud words in the Speech, those that named Orannis himself, came to a close:  _To wake, to sleep; never, forever._  
“Dog!” screamed Lirael in desperation, not knowing what the bitch could do to ease her suffering, but immediately there was a new pain as the Dog removed her ruined hand and absorbed the Ninth’s rage. Lirael’s body filled with a new pain, and a subtler one.  
“Dog...I love you.”  
“And what’s loved, lives.”  
They found Lirael sobbing, cradling a soapstone statue in a crater at the end of the world.

**Author's Note:**

> Orannis...you scary.  
> I like the idea of Mogget/Yrael's Choice being prolonged until the conclusion of Abhorsen...and the sassy dog. Let me know how I did, if you don't mind.


End file.
